Full of Weeping
by echoes mourn
Summary: What if your child wasn't your child? And what if no one believed it but you?


**Disclaimer: **House isn't mine. But a girl can always dream…

**A/N: **This story deals with postpartum psychosis, a real and very serious condition that affects about one out of every thousand new mothers. If this subject might bother you, please read carefully.

On a lighter note, though the medical information is as accurate as I can make it, I'm still only an English major, not a doctor. Many thanks to all my past readers and reviewers, and please do keep those reviews coming – and maybe some ideas for another story or two…

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_Slow healing_

_Low growth/weight gain_

_Irritability_

_Sensitivity to light_

_Disrupted sleep patterns_

_Low white/t-cell count_

House finished scrawling the last symptom and looked over at Chase and Foreman. "Ready? And…go," he said, making a show of checking his watch.

"Cameron isn't here," Chase pointed out. "Looks like this patient could use an immunologist."

"Our immunologist is currently getting the patient history. Not that there's much history for a patient who's only thirteen months old, but I'm sure she's getting some good stuff from mom and dad. Come on, get started."

"SCID," Foreman suggested. "Or a vitamin A deficiency."

House nodded and started a list on the right hand side of the board.

"Are there any signs of neurological impairment? Then it might be myalgic encephalomyelitis. Or lupus," Chase added, his voice indistinct because of the coffee stirrer currently in his mouth.

House wrote down the first suggestion, then gave Chase a withering look. "You're just saying that because Cameron isn't here."

"And he's a little young for ME," Foreman pointed out.

Chase rummaged through the file and held out a piece of paper. "Well, look at this. The antibody tests indicate—"

"They indicate that the last hospital he was at had crappy technicians. We're redoing everything," House said, snatching the paper away. "Besides, little Bobby—"

"Brian," Foreman said automatically, though he knew it was no use.

"—whatever, doesn't have any signs of fever, joint pain, rash, or any of the classics, so lupus is extremely unlikely. In fact, it's _always_ unlikely."

Cameron's return interrupted whatever sullen reply Chase was preparing. "Ah, the immunologist herself," House said. "Give us all the juicy details." He brandished the marker in his hand and gave a suggestive smirk.

Cameron ignored this, her expression serious. "I think we need to admit the mother for treatment, too."

"She's got symptoms?" Foreman asked, surprised.

"Of severe post-partum depression, yes. Her husband noticed it a few weeks after Brian was born, and he's been trying to get her to go to counseling, but she insists she's fine. But she's been withdrawn, barely eating, barely sleeping – she's got all the classic signs. And since Brian's gotten sick, she's started blaming herself for his illness, and—"

"And, yes?" House said, tapping his cane impatiently.

"She's having delusions," Cameron said slowly. "She insists that Brian isn't her baby."

House raised an eyebrow. "That should be dad's line, shouldn't it?"

"What, does she think the maternity ward made a mistake?" Foreman asked doubtfully.

Cameron shook her head, still unhappy. "According to her, she just woke up one morning and knew that her son wasn't really her son."

Chase looked up from the file. "There's no doubt who his parents are. They ran blood and bone marrow tests on all three of them for possible transfusions and transplants, and that is definitely their biological child."

"She isn't thinking rationally. Test results won't convince her. She needs psychiatric help."

"Since when does post-partum depression just magically turn into full-blown post-partum psychosis?" House asked, studying the way his cane bounced when he hit it on the floor.

"That's been bothering me, too," Cameron admitted. "Psychosis would have started a long time ago. That's usually within six to eight weeks of delivery, not almost a year later. But she definitely needs a psychological workup."

Chase shrugged. "If she was already depressed, maybe the extra stress of the baby's illness has caused other problems to surface. Any history of mental illness in the family?"

"Only in her husband's family," Cameron replied dryly. "He has an aunt who's schizophrenic."

"Chase, go get mommy dearest scheduled for a full psych evaluation," House said suddenly.

"And if she refuses again?" the intensivist shot back.

"Oh, she won't be able to resist you. Just bat those baby blues at her and tell her in your sexiest accent that this is her best chance of getting her kid back."

-------------------------------

"I can really get him back?"

Chase had seen more terrified and mourning parents than he cared to remember. There was no getting used to such a sight, but if you didn't develop at least a veneer of professional detachment, you wouldn't last six months.

But there was something about the pale, huddled figure of Julia Sullivan that still managed to make Chase uneasy. One of his professors had been a history buff, and she'd mentioned that long ago, people suffering from disorders like sleep paralysis had been called 'hag-ridden', reflecting the feeling that a heavy weight was pressing the body down. Julia certainly looked as though some invisible pressure had worn her down until there was almost nothing left.

It was her eyes, though, that were most disturbing. They refused to focus on anything except her own inner nightmare.

"We think that this is your best chance of that, yes. The more we know about what happened, the better." He glanced at Julia's husband, Paul, relieved the man was quietly playing along, and then nodded to the woman who'd been waiting off to the side. She stepped forward and smiled gently as Chase introduced her.

"This is Dr. Janelle Barton. If you could tell her everything that's been happening, I'm sure it will help." Janelle had gone back to school to become a clinical psychologist after her own bout with PPD twenty years ago, when it was still dismissed as simple 'baby blues', and Chase was grateful to have her here.

Julia looked pleadingly at her husband. "I don't think I can explain. But—"

Paul squeezed her hand gently. "Just try, sweetheart, all right? I won't be far away. If you need me, just send someone to get me. I'll be with Brian."

She snatched her hand away, and the exhausted, broken woman suddenly flared to angry life. "That isn't Brian! We shouldn't have to take care of that thing! How many times do I have to tell you?"

Paul shrank back involuntarily. "I know, I'm sorry. I know. Just—just please, talk to Dr. Barton."

After one startled, sympathetic glance at Chase and Paul, Barton recovered and took charge. "Call me Janelle. You can come back here to your husband whenever you like, but first why don't you try telling me what happened? I'd really like to help you."

As soon as Barton had started speaking, Julia seemed to shrink and return to her former ghostlike state, all the anger and energy draining out of her again. "I don't think I can explain," she said again, her voice barely audible. But she let Barton guide her up out of her chair and down the hall.

"Just give it a try, that's all I ask," Barton said soothingly as they walked away. "It might help you to try."

This left Chase standing in the middle of an awkward silence for a moment.

"She wasn't herself before," Paul finally said haltingly. "I could see she wasn't – didn't have the energy to take care of Brian. I took paternity leave and sick days until they started talking about firing me. Then I hired a part-time nanny. Things seemed to be getting a little better. But just these last few weeks, she – there's nothing left of her. She didn't even want to bring Brian to the hospital." He looked up at Chase imploringly.

"We believe that your wife has post-partum psychosis," Chase explained, glad he could at least give it a name. "It's sometimes called a severe form of post-partum depression, but studies indicate that they're actually separate conditions. The good news is that it is treatable with therapy and standard anti-psychotic medication. The bad news is that it will likely take a few months before your wife is back to herself. You should start thinking about friends or relatives who might be able to help you through this."

Paul nodded tiredly. "So she should be all right," he said, as though having difficulty with the words. "What about Brian?" A kind of dull horror spread over his face. "Did Julia – when she didn't know what she was doing – did she—?"

Chase hurried to cut him off. "There's absolutely no indication that Brian was neglected or abused in any way. The fact that he hasn't been growing as much as he should is part of his illness, not because he wasn't fed properly. None of this is your wife's fault. Or yours."

Paul nodded again, this time letting a little of the tension drain from his shoulders. "Do you know what's wrong with him yet?"

"We're running some tests right now, so we'll know more soon. In the meantime, your son's condition is perfectly stable. You might want to try and get some rest."

He didn't quite scoff at the idea, but his expression made it clear what he thought. "I'll try," he said unconvincingly.

"We'll let you know as soon as we know anything." Chase gave a reassuring smile and nod and turned to head back to the lab. It was always a faint, guilty relief to leave the presence of frightened parents. But this time, relief was haunted by his memory of the sudden, shocking fury he'd seen in Julia's eyes.

------------------------------------

With a flourish, House crossed off the last possible disease on the board and glanced back over his shoulder. "Okay, obviously you guys have to start doing better than this."

"Menkes Disease?" Foreman said, trying to put a confidence he didn't feel into the words.

"No seizures, no hypothermia, and no weird hair," House said. "Other than that, nice try."

"Infantile Refsum Disease would explain—"

Foreman cut Cameron off. "IRD would have shown itself long before this."

"Come on, people, we're missing something!" House threw down the marker in frustration, then paused and looked around. "Come to think of it, we're missing Chase."

"He stopped to check on Brian," Cameron said.

"_Check_ on him? Isn't that what Cuddy pays all those nurses for? I hope you mean he's doing something practical like getting the latest vitals or some more blood."

As if on cue, Chase appeared. "We've got a new symptom."

"Great, lay it on me," House said, with something approaching enthusiasm as he retrieved his marker.

"He's in a coma." Chase glared at House, though his heart wasn't really in it. "Minor motor responses, but nothing else. We're losing him."

This made even House hesitate, though not for long. "All right, you two go test for Menkes and IRD," he ordered, waving his cane at Chase and Foreman. "I know, long shots at best, but try anyway," he added before they could protest.

"Cameron, you and I are going to go have a talk with dad. Since mom's still out to lunch, we'll have to see what else we can find out from him."

"Don't push him too hard or we'll have the whole family as patients. He's on the verge of a breakdown," Chase said as he hesitated at the door.

"The family that breaks down together, stays together. Wait, that doesn't sound right. Never mind, just go," House finished irately, making shooing motions at the younger doctor.

-----------------------------

"Chase might be right. If we push too hard, he might just have hysterics."

"That's why you're here. It's a good doctor, bad doctor thing. When I'm mean to him, he'll turn to the pretty young doctor and pour his troubles on to your sympathetic bosom. Hmm, this is actually starting to sound kind of kinky."

Cameron rolled her eyes. "Oh, come on. I know you don't think much of the idea, but just this once, maybe he's actually already told us everything he knows. Maybe he isn't lying about anything."

"He can't do that. It would break my perfect record. Besides, not having my vast medical knowledge, maybe he doesn't know he's skipping something important."

Paul was making no pretense of trying to rest, instead pacing around the small waiting room nearest his son. He gasped faintly when he saw House and Cameron approaching. "Have you found out something?"

"Not yet," Cameron said, with a quick, nervous glance at House. "We've eliminated several possibilities—"

Then House pounced, and Cameron flinched at his words. "Your son's dying. You have to tell us everything you remember about when the symptoms started – anything new in his food, his routine, anything. Even if it seems completely trivial."

Paul was still wrestling with the first three words. "Dying? But—Dr. Chase said he was st-stable."

Cameron gave House a frosty look and turned to the distraught man. "Mr. Sullivan, please, just try to remember. Did Brian have any other symptoms early on, like a fever?"

"I—No, no fever. He—he hadn't been sleeping well, but he started doing better right around the time he—he got sick." He had spoken like a man half asleep, but now he suddenly came awake. "Isn't there something you can do to help him? You should be with him!"

"He's being looked after," Cameron began, but her words were cut off by the shrill ring of a bell nearby. All three jumped and looked towards the sound.

House was the first to move, Cameron following an instant later. "Mr. Sullivan, you have to leave, now. Get out of the building!" the immunologist yelled over the sound.

"Is it a fire? What's wrong? I have to get Brian!" He scrambled towards the door.

"We'll get him! Go!"

Any further protests were drowned by the alarm and the sudden rush of people in the hall. It was a mostly-controlled chaos, but Paul couldn't help but be swept up in the rush as the nurses efficiently pointed everyone who could walk on their own towards the fire exits. House and Cameron had to fight against the crowd, the older doctor using his cane to encourage people to get out of their way.

For a minute, Cameron allowed herself to hope it was a false alarm. There was no smoke or flames, no sign of anything wrong except for the hurrying throng and that incessant bell cutting through her eardrums. But as they reached the entrance to the NICU, there was the sharp scent of melting plastic and singed metal, and she caught her breath instinctively.

Frantic voices filled the air. "Where's that smoke coming from?"

"What's wrong with the damn sprinklers? Shouldn't they be on?"

"Don't move her yet! Get the portable respirator! Get the—"

"—tachycardia! Push half a mil of lidocaine!"

House was ignoring the chaos and heading straight towards Brian, lying still and helpless in his bassinet, a web of wires and tubes surrounding him. Cameron saw with alarm that the child's skin was a uniform gray, giving him the look of a statue on an infant's grave.

"His heart rate's dropping. O2 sats are... all over the place. Should we move him?" She looked around, coughing, still unable to see any flames.

"Nah, let's leave him here. His parents won't mind if their baby gets barbecued, will they? Mom sure won't."

The snark was automatic. All his attention was really on Brian, and he frowned darkly. "He's not only unresponsive, he's stiff. Some kind of paralysis."

The words were hardly out of his mouth before a sudden jet of flame shot into the room from a vent near the ceiling, almost immediately over their heads. Both of them ducked, each putting an arm protectively over the comatose infant.

There were screams and gasps of surprise around the room. One nurse grabbed a fire extinguisher and readied it to fight the flames as an orderly raced over to help. The sprinklers came on at last, but they were unable to do anything more than soak the occupants of the room, since the fire itself was now back lurking inside the vent.

House and Cameron saw none of this, heard nothing of the screams and shouted orders. As the flames had shot out, filling the room with orange light, the infant they were trying to shield suddenly screamed. The sound blended strangely with the shrieking alarm, and the two doctors looked first at each other, then at the child, with growing confusion.

His clear blue eyes were open, and, Cameron thought dazedly, furious. There was no other word for it, though the expression was beyond unsettling on an infant's face.

Then his eyes shut again, and the moment was gone so swiftly that Cameron was sure it must have been a trick of the angry firelight.

And there was no time to think about it now. With the orderly's help, the nurse with the fire extinguisher was tackling the flames, and Cameron and House could only slide Brian's bassinet out of the way.

House took off his suit jacket and tossed it over the child, and he and Cameron maneuvered their patient and another one of the infants out into the hall with great care. They worked smoothly without exchanging a word, letting the noise and confusion wash over them like the water from the sprinklers.

At last, the room was clear and the firefighters had arrived, hauling hoses and equipment past the doctors and nurses huddled down the hall, tending to the fragile infants. Cuddy stood to the side, taking in the damage with lips pressed together and a frown set on her forehead. The sprinklers now only dripped occasionally, and fortunately none of the babies seemed to have suffered any serious effects, but the scene was still an overwhelming one.

Cameron, drenched but relieved that things hadn't been even worse, gave Cuddy a sympathetic look before turning back to House and their patient. Then two things happened at once. A woman's voice down the hall began calling Brian's name, and Brian himself began to cry lustily.

House yanked aside his soaked jacket to reveal the baby, now pink-skinned and apparently just as healthy as his energetic cries would suggest. After exchanging an astonished look with House, Cameron went to work checking the boy's vitals. House straightened up and watched intently as Julia Sullivan, wild-eyed and smeared with soot, hurried towards them through the crowd.

"Brian, Brian," she sobbed. People stepped out of her way and looked at her sympathetically. House just stared, and had she not been so distracted by the sight of her child, she would have stopped cold at the anger in his eyes.

As soon as she reached him, Julia immediately tried to scoop Brian into her arms, and Cameron had to step in between them. "Mrs. Sullivan, please, I have to make sure that he's all right."

House put his cane up to keep the woman back. "Shouldn't you be in the psycho ward?" he asked coldly.

"He's back, he's back, everything's all right now." Julia's eyes could focus on nothing but the child, and her hands pushed against the restriction of the cane House still held at waist-level.

But he braced himself and pushed her further away, and her surprised gaze managed to find him for a moment. "What are you doing?"

"I'm making sure you don't get anything nasty on him. You did wash your hands after setting that fire, right? Some of those accelerants can really irritate the skin."

Cameron gave House a startled glance, but any doubts she might have had vanished when she saw the look on Julia's face. Guilt and fear shivered over her face like rain running down a window, and Cameron felt ill.

"It was the only way! They told me—I had to! It was the only way!"

She was shrieking now, and heads turned towards her. Finally seeing House's icy stare, she flinched and wrapped her arms around her body, shivering. "Is he all right? He is all right, isn't he? Are—are all the babies all right?" Her eyes seemed to fully register the confusion around her for the first time.

"I don't think anyone was hurt, no. Brian's fine," Cameron said quietly, finishing her examination. She began gently disconnecting the various monitors and IV tubes from the squalling infant, catching House's eye. "There's nothing wrong with him anymore."

House's eyes narrowed, but there was no doubting the evidence. Julia stumbled forward again to claim her child, but now Cameron stopped her with an upraised hand. "I think we'd better look after Brian for a while." There was a spark of sympathy in her eyes, but her voice was firm.

Julia stared at the young doctor mutely. Then she nodded once, slowly, took a step back, and crumpled to the floor.

----------------------------

Soon Brian was in the hands of Foreman and Chase, and Julia was back in the psych department, this time in a locked ward. A horrified Dr. Barton explained that Julia had gotten restless, so she'd arranged for a mild sedative. Even that was enough to put the woman into an exhausted sleep, so when another patient nearby had seized, Barton had thought it safe to go and help. But when she'd returned to the room, she'd found no sign of Julia. They'd been about to raise the alarm when the fire alarm had beaten them to it, but Barton would never have guessed that Julia would have been so dangerous.

"Except for her delusion about her son, she was perfectly calm, and most of her anger about that was directed at herself. She insisted it was her fault Brian was gone, and that she was the only one who could get him back. But otherwise she was simply exhausted – deeply depressed, but more dangerous to herself than anyone else."

Cameron shot House a glare before he could manage a biting comment, determined not to have to play referee, and murmured a few reassuring words to Barton. The older woman left to take charge of Julia, frowning unhappily.

"I'm going to go find some scrubs," Cameron said tiredly. Her hair was plastered to her head and her blouse clung in uncomfortable places, her efforts to peel the fabric away only making it stick elsewhere. She'd already shed her sodden lab coat, which helped, but the overall effect was still of having run a marathon in the pouring rain.

House fell into step with her as she headed down the hall, his clear blue eyes studying her for a moment. "Maybe you should get used to this. I'm seriously considering starting a 'Wet T-Shirt Friday' just for you."

Her expression hovered somewhere between a grimace and a grin. "What, not for Cuddy, too?"

"Pfft. She shows everything off all the time anyway."

She managed a disapproving glare, but her thoughts were clearly elsewhere. After walking in silence for a moment, she said, "You don't think she does have post-partum psychosis, do you?"

"I _know_… that there's a reason that I'm not a shrink."

It was never reassuring to find House at a loss for certainty. "What if she isn't delusional?" she asked quietly.

House was silent for a moment as they both remembered the child's sudden transformation from near-death to apparently perfect health. Foreman and Chase had been running tests since the fire, and had so far found nothing wrong. "If she isn't delusional, then she's got a hell of a lot of explaining to do to Cuddy."

"House…"

"I know, I know. If she is delusional, then we've just witnessed a miracle cure. If she isn't delusional, then somehow, someone managed to swap a sick baby for a healthy but otherwise identical baby without us seeing them or even moving my coat. If it's the second option, someone could make a fortune taking that act on the road."

"No one could have managed a baby swap," Cameron said firmly.

"So the agnostic votes for a miracle cure?"

"It doesn't have to be a miracle. Sometimes people just get better."

But her tone was faintly hesitant, and House caught it immediately. "They just 'get better' from unexplained comas in the space of two minutes?"

Cameron sighed. "No."

"Glad we cleared that up."

She sighed again, then spoke quickly, trying to get the words out before she changed her mind. "Did you ever read those old fairy tales? The really old ones, I mean, the originals – not the sanitized versions."

"If you read those when you were a kid, that does help explain how you can put up with me so well." She raised an eyebrow at him, which he answered with a glare before continuing. "You won't believe in God, but you will believe in Wee Folk running around snatching babies out of cradles?"

She shrugged slowly and pushed back a damp strand of hair before answering. "It fits all the facts."

"So does mass hypnosis. Is that going to be your next suggestion?"

Still moving slowly and thoughtfully, she shook her head. "No, my next suggestion is that sometimes… we just have to deal with not knowing the answer."

The expression on House's face could hardly have been more disbelieving if Cameron had suddenly made an insulting comment about his mother. She hastened on. "Our patient is healthy. None of the other babies were hurt. Mrs. Sullivan's getting help. It's as happy an ending as we're likely to get. Maybe we should just move on."

They had reached the women's locker room, and they both stood quietly for a moment in the hall. Finally House looked down at the cane in his hand. "Awfully unscientific," he said, then looked back up at Cameron. "Speaking of which, don't forget that T-shirt tomorrow."

"As long as you promise to forget your T-shirt, sure," Cameron replied, very seriously, before turning and slipping into the locker room. House was left standing in the hall, blinking, before smiling wryly and continuing on his way.

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"…but your patient's all right," Wilson said slowly.

"Released half an hour ago into the custody of a confused but doting father," was House's reply. He'd disdained the option of scrubs, as usual, and was wearing the spare jeans and band T-shirt from the bag stashed in his office.

"And the mother's in the psych ward, so she's obviously not your patient."

"Nope. Though by the time they're done shrinking her head, she might need a real doctor."

"Okay, I give up. What's bothering you?"

"Who said anything was bothering me?" Pushing open the door to his office, House turned wide, innocent blue eyes towards the oncologist.

"You dragged me out of a consult with Chen to tell me this whole bizarre story because there _isn't_ anything bothering you?"

"All right, I admit it. Cameron's wet shirt is bothering me. I can't stop thinking about it."

Wilson held up a hand. "If you're that kind of bothered, then you need to drag Cameron away from whatever she's doing. I can't help you there."

"I knew it. You've just been stringing me along all these years."

"House, seriously. What's the problem?"

"I don't know. That is the problem."

He lowered himself into his chair, staring at a spot on the carpet somewhere near Wilson's left shoe. Only the desk lamp was on, and the last few rays of the setting sun gave no illumination.

Wilson studied his friend quietly for a moment. "Look, just give me half an hour or so to finish up some things and then we can go get mildly plastered. All right?"

House finally looked up, raising an eyebrow. "Only mildly?"

"Some of us do actually work on Fridays, you know. I'll be back later."

It was only a few moments after he left that Cameron appeared in the doorway. She was now wearing soft pink scrubs and had her long hair pulled back into a somewhat bedraggled ponytail. Her shoulders slumped faintly under the weight of an exhausting day. But in that moment, House couldn't have taken his eyes off of her if the whole hospital had caught on fire.

Something of this must have shown in his face, for Cameron was suddenly nervous and awkward. Perversely, this only made her more fascinating. "I… just wanted to let you know that it doesn't look like they'll be pressing charges against Mrs. Sullivan. They're still waiting on the final results of the psych evaluation, but the DA's office seems pretty convinced that she was legally insane when she started the fire."

House didn't miss the qualifier. "But not _actually_ insane?"

"I prefer to leave those questions to the lawyers and the psychiatrists," she said dryly. "Anyway, good night." She started to duck quickly back through the still-open door, but House's voice stopped her.

"Wilson and I are going to go get mildly plastered."

"Only mildly?" She relaxed just enough to lean against the door frame, though her arms were crossed tightly over her chest.

House made a face. "The adverb is Wilson's. Want to come along?"

Casual as his tone was, the question still froze Cameron. "Um… I'm not exactly dressed for going out," she finally managed, gesturing at her scrubs.

"We're only going to my place," House said, though he had no idea what Wilson had actually planned. "So no frou-frou umbrella drinks or anything."

"Um, okay. Sure. Just give me five minutes to organize some of this paperwork and I'm all set." She couldn't quite keep the grin from her face as she turned again to go back into the conference room.

"Cameron."

"Yeah?" she asked, a little breathlessly.

"You do like _The L Word_, right?"

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Where the wandering water gushes  
From the hills above Glen-Car,.  
In pools among the rushes  
That scarce could bathe a star,  
We seek for slumbering trout  
And whispering in their ears  
Give them unquiet dreams;  
Leaning softly out  
From ferns that drop their tears  
Over the young streams.  
_Come away, O human child!  
To the waters and the wild  
With a faery, hand in hand,  
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand._

_-The Stolen Child_

_-William Butler Yeats, 1886_


End file.
